I hate to cook. One of my favorite lines is “I only have a stove because it came with the house!” That’s not to say I do not know how to cook, I have actually mastered a number of recipes over the years, I just do not like to cook. I do however love to bake. Brownies from scratch, apple pie with a crumb topping and homemade crust, blondies, whoopee pies, and trifles of any color combination imaginable are just a few of my favorites. My talent though or my “something I am good at” is cakes. I bake I frost and I decorate cakes.
It started with birthday cakes for my children. You cannot have “a whale of a birthday” without a whale cake so I went to the party store, bought a book and grabbed a friend. As simple as that a new hobby was born. We experimented with “from scratch” cakes but quickly decided that from the box was better. We developed a series of steps that provided us with “the moistest cake I have ever tasted”. We did and still do make our own butter- cream frosting and we can use it but are not huge fans of fondant. Soon we were making the cake for every family birthday. We made race car cakes, dinosaur cakes and a variety of Barbie cakes. We have done Power Rangers and Mickey Mouse and DR Seuss. I make a 21st birthday cake that includes two champagne flutes and a bottle of bubbly. We have also done a fair share of adult themed cakes. Soon friends of the family started requesting cakes and the cakes started getting bigger. We have created a number of wedding cakes but our most requested is a three tiered cake with fresh fruit atop each layer. Before we knew it, we were delivering cakes to people we did not even know. That however is not how we knew we were good at decorating cakes.
When my girls were little I would ask them if they knew “what it was” when I finished decorating a cake. If they answered correctly I figured that meant I had “done good”. Then we started delivering cakes and people seemed genuinely pleased with their purchase so I figured that meant we had “done good”. What I did not see in the beginning but realize now is that the “good” was in the time spent with a friend: time that took us away from the stresses of everyday life, time spent laughing and sharing stories and solving problems. It was a time to be creative, a time when everything was right and nothing was wrong. As the years went by it became time spent with my girls. The smell of fresh frosting or the promise of fresh trimmed cake top never fails to draw them to the kitchen. Over finger tips of frosting and tiny bites of cake we can solve even the most insurmountable problems of middle school. We can talk about boy trouble and test anxiety. We can even talk about speeding tickets and court fines. It isn’t what we talk about that is important though, it’s that we talk. My cakes are moist and flavorful and beautiful and creative but that is not how I know I am good at decorating cakes. I know I am good at decorating cakes because doing so brought me closer to my children.
It started with birthday cakes for my children. You cannot have “a whale of a birthday” without a whale cake so I went to the party store, bought a book and grabbed a friend. As simple as that a new hobby was born. We experimented with “from scratch” cakes but quickly decided that from the box was better. We developed a series of steps that provided us with “the moistest cake I have ever tasted”. We did and still do make our own butter- cream frosting and we can use it but are not huge fans of fondant. Soon we were making the cake for every family birthday. We made race car cakes, dinosaur cakes and a variety of Barbie cakes. We have done Power Rangers and Mickey Mouse and DR Seuss. I make a 21st birthday cake that includes two champagne flutes and a bottle of bubbly. We have also done a fair share of adult themed cakes. Soon friends of the family started requesting cakes and the cakes started getting bigger. We have created a number of wedding cakes but our most requested is a three tiered cake with fresh fruit atop each layer. Before we knew it, we were delivering cakes to people we did not even know. That however is not how we knew we were good at decorating cakes.
When my girls were little I would ask them if they knew “what it was” when I finished decorating a cake. If they answered correctly I figured that meant I had “done good”. Then we started delivering cakes and people seemed genuinely pleased with their purchase so I figured that meant we had “done good”. What I did not see in the beginning but realize now is that the “good” was in the time spent with a friend: time that took us away from the stresses of everyday life, time spent laughing and sharing stories and solving problems. It was a time to be creative, a time when everything was right and nothing was wrong. As the years went by it became time spent with my girls. The smell of fresh frosting or the promise of fresh trimmed cake top never fails to draw them to the kitchen. Over finger tips of frosting and tiny bites of cake we can solve even the most insurmountable problems of middle school. We can talk about boy trouble and test anxiety. We can even talk about speeding tickets and court fines. It isn’t what we talk about that is important though, it’s that we talk. My cakes are moist and flavorful and beautiful and creative but that is not how I know I am good at decorating cakes. I know I am good at decorating cakes because doing so brought me closer to my children.